Talk:Flag of France

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Heraldry and Vexillology Portal

Flag of France is within the scope of the Heraldry and vexillology WikiProject, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of heraldry and vexillology. If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.
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Contents

[edit] Flag of France

As currently stands I agree Tricolore is the place for this, but ideally it'd be nice to move it back to Flag of France and expand the portion on past flags of France, along the lines of Flag of Germany. --Delirium 09:57, Aug 25, 2003 (UTC)

drat! I just moved it here! A history of all the different flags of france sounds like a very good idea though -- Tarquin 09:59, 25 Aug 2003 (UTC)
To bring this article into parallelism with the rest of [[Category:National flags]], I wish to have this article moved back to Flag of France. Denelson83 04:56, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Tricolor vs. Tricouleur

Too bad about 'Tricolore' instead of 'Tricouleur.' Might be why no page links here. Does it mess things up to change a title? User:Wetman

[edit] Stripe widths

The three stripes are NOT of equal width. If the white stripe was the same width as the others the eye would perceive it as being broader because it is lighter. The blue and red stripes are actually wider by precisely-defined amounts so that all three are perceived as possessing egalité. And I know that's true because I read it somewhere. :-P - Lee M 03:40, 19 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I think that's only the case when the flag is seen at sea. The national flag on land has equal widths for the three stripes. Denelson83 22:52, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
They ARE now of uniform width, except at sea, according to the French site (and they ought to know I guess). So did the "regulation dated 17 May 1853" relate to chaging the width of the naval flag back again? I've assumed so in my edit. 80.43.134.61 00:30, 9 Oct 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Article title

"Tricolore" is unfortunately not an English language word, and "Tricolor" is the way this flag is referenced in English. I think it really ought to be back to the drawing board on this particular disambiguation: the distinction between tricolored flags and the Tricolor is through capitalization or specification, and since Wikipedia doesn't permit the capitalization distinction, another way ought to be found that is less misleading. - Nunh-huh 07:22, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

A distinction should be made between tricolor (tricolour) flags in general and the proper name of the French tricolor flag. The former should be rendered in English; the latter is a proper noun that should be capitalized and may or may not have an accepted English-language variation. (I'm still hunting for Wikipedia and printed style guidelines on this area.) The one thing I can say for sure at the moment is that, for the generic usage, "tricolor" is preferred in American English, while "tricolour" is preferred in British English. For this reason, any link to the article "Tricolour" should be spelled that way (based on Wikipedia policies to [A] retain spelling of article creator for non-US, non-UK subjects and [B] use direct links rather than redirected links). Mentioning the alternate US spelling is not a bad idea. On the other hand, the statement "more commonly known as the Tricolour" [emphasis mine], which refers to the specific Flag of France, appears to be inaccurately based on British POV. I am researching this and will shortly report my results (and edit the article text on that basis) in the "General 'Tricolore' spelling issues" section below. -- Jeff Q 22:29, 7 Jul 2004 (UTC)

[edit] General "Tricolore" spelling issues

The current state of the phrase "more commonly known as the Tricolor (Tricolour)" still strikes me as odd, since these labels are implicitly preferred over the article's name. One might ask, "Which is it? Tricolore, Tricolor, or Tricolour? (Or even Tricouleur?) And who says which?" I was going to revise this phrase to say the following:

… more commonly known as the Tricolore (French), Tricolor (US English), or Tricolour (UK English)…

… but I was unsure on two points. First, my French isn't adequate to discern the difference between tricouleur and tricolore, so I don't know which is the correct term for The Flag. Second, if the French term is given, shouldn't it be "le (drapeau?) tricolore" rather than "the Tricolore"? Could someone with a better command of not only the language, but the usage in this case, make a definitive statement? As a self-appointed member of the Wiki link cleanup crew, I'd be happy to move around and/or rename pages and links from any pages using any variation, if I only knew the answer. — Jeff Q 21:21, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)

To sum up the spelling and usage issues at hand in this article…

There are three basic prevailing practices for referring to non-English, Latin script-based proper nouns in English:

  1. Use the original language's exact spelling (possibly dropping accents).
  2. Use an English translation of the name.
  3. Use an Anglicized spelling of the original name.

For the most part, en:Wikipedia seems generally to recommend #3, but indicates that the overriding concern is to ensure English speakers recognize the name. (Tricolore would seem to need no Anglicized spelling for such recognition.) The current Wikipedia:Proper names article doesn't provide explicit guidelines on which practice to use for things with proper names. As is mentioned somewhere in the Wikipedia:Naming conventions oeuvre (I don't recall where), modern practice is moving toward #1; i.e., using original names for terms in Latin alphabets that don't have an English translation in common use.

Two issues raised in this Talk page are:

  1. What do the French call their flag?
  2. What do English speakers call the French flag?

There are apparently four relevant variations on the spelling of this article's subject:

  1. Tricolore
  2. Tricolour
  3. Tricolor
  4. Tricouleur

I checked with six different online French-to-English dictionaries. Four had no entries for any of these. Two (french-linguistics.co.uk's French/English Dictionary and univ-rennesl.fr's Dictionnaire Français-Anglais) had entries for tricolore, but no alternate. A French-only Google search turned up about 82,000 hits, 89% of which used tricolore. (Even though the French would for "color" is couleur, the spelling tricouleur had less than 0.1% Google prevalence.) Along with some other specific references I ran into, plus my rusty memory of French, this strongly suggests to me that the French call their flag le tricolore (or le drapeau), without capitalization. I will proceed on this basis unless and until someone with more French experience corrects me. This also means that the article title is accurate, excepting only that, if it weren't for the Wiki practice of capitalizing the first letter of any article title, it might more accurately be tricolore. (And thus the problem is effectively moot.)

For English usage, an English-only Google search gave about 330,000 hits, 58% for "tricolor" and 33% for "tricolour" (reflecting a preponderance of US-based Web pages, I suspect). I found that Merriam-Webster Online (US) listed "tricolor" as both the general term and the name of the French flag. Cambridge Dictionaries Online (UK) was more informative, giving the spellings as "tricolour UK, US tricolor". Neither MWO nor CDO gave a proper-noun citation of this term. (MWO cited its use as "the French tricolor", CDO "the French tricolour". Both uses imply the general case; i.e., "the tricolor that is French", rather than specifically "the Tricolore".) The lack of a proper noun (e.g., "Tricolor" or "Tricolour") in either reference suggests that neither English spelling is in scholarly use as the proper name of French flag. (It may very well be used in common writing and in modern news articles — even the latter of which demonstrate an increasing illiteracy through egregious spelling, punctuation, and grammatical errors — but a capitalized English variation is apparently not accepted as official.) On this basis, I plan to change the wording of the first sentence in the article to the following:

The tricolore is the national flag of France. Known to English speakers as the French tricolour (UK) or tricolor (US), it features three vertical bands coloured blue (hoist side), white, and red.

This accomplishs three previously-unmet goals:

  1. The first line of the article matches the article's title in a Wiki-standard fashion.
  2. Both English spellings are provided.
  3. The link to the general term tricolour is included without implying any official English name in preference to the français tricolore.

I will also change the other "tricolour" reference to "tricolore", the latter of which is already used in the article, both for consistency and to avoid further debate of UK vs. US spellings in an article on a French subject. Hopefully this will put a rest to this issue. -- Jeff Q 00:26, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Page move

(from WP:RM)

[edit] Tricolore → Flag of France; Tiranga → Flag of India

  • The reason for this move is to bring the article into parallelism with the other articles listed in Category:National flags. Denelson83 04:59, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
  • Would not object if you realized that the spelling is la "tricoleur." Tricolore is the Italian flag. Therefore, I'm forced to object. —ExplorerCDT 17:30, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)
  • An objection on the grounds that "tricolore" refers to the Italian flag makes no sense to me, since the content of the article is about the French flag--in fact, that is all the more reason to move the content to Flag of France. The only issue resulting from the fact that the article has been at the wrong name is that the redir created by the move should be changed to redir to Flag of Italy. I totally support this move, and hope ExplorerCDT reconsiders. I kinda wish someone had just brought this to my attention on my talk page, instead of posting here--I would have just corrected the problem without delay. Niteowlneils 18:01, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)
  • ExplorerCDT: According to the Oxford Hachette French Dictionary, tricolore is a French word, having among its meanings "the tricolour, the French flag". The Web site of the Présidence de la République also calls the French flag le drapeau tricolore. [1] Feel free to correct them. (BTW, drapeau tricoleur only gets 14 hits on Google.) --Tkinias 13:45, 22 Nov 2004 (UTC)
    • Google also has about 806 hits for tricoleur, which is the preferred spelling according to Dictionnaire de l’Académie francaise. —ExplorerCDT 15:02, 22 Nov 2004 (UTC)
      • As opposed to 461,000 hits for tricolore (some of which do, indeed, refer to the Italian flag, but some also to the French). Try "drapeau tricoleur" (quoted) and you get zero hits, plus a helpful Did you mean: "drapeau tricolor". Drapeau tricolor is never going to be Italian. Since only A-N of the Dictionnaire are on line, I'll have to take your word for their preference... but I see no reason not to have tricoleur as a redirect. I agree, BTW, that tricolore more commonly refers in English to the Italian flag. However, it is not at all unambiguous, and tricolore should be a disambiguation page pointing either to tricolore (France) and tricolore (Italy) or Flag of France and Flag of Italy. —Tkinias 15:58, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)
  • Agree (I never exactly voted in the above discussion). To clarify: as ExplorerCDT pointed out, tricolore can also be the Flag of Italy, so the article should be moved and a disambig page set up at Tricolore. —Tkinias 00:36, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)
  • I am from France, and I would like to add something here, since I don't really understand the controversy. In the French language of France, "tricolore" is an adjective, it means "having three colors", and it can be used for the French flag (as in "le drapeau tricolore"), but also for traffic lights (as in "un feu tricolore"), and son on. It is not a word reserved only for the flag. "Tricolore" is very rarely used as a noun ("le tricolore"). In fact when French people refer to their flag, they either call it "les couleurs", as in "saluer les couleurs" (salute the flag), or they call it "le drapeau bleu-blanc-rouge", as in "agiter un drapeau bleu-blanc-rouge" (to waive a French flag). The word "tricoleur" simply does not exist in French.
    Now in English, there's the word "tricolor" (or "tricolour" if you are in the British Isles), and this word can be used as a noun unlike in France, and it refers to any flag with three stripes of colors, oftentimes the French flag. It seems because English speakers say "the tricolor" when they refer to the French flag, they assume that French people say "le tricolore" when they talk about their flag, which I'm sorry to say we don't. So if you want the article to have a French title, it should be "Drapeau tricolore" or "Drapeau bleu-blanc-rouge" or "Drapeau de la France", but if you want the title in English, which seems more logical to me since this is the English Wikipedia, then the title should logically be "Flag of France". To have the article titled "Tricolore" (with an "e" in the end) is simply silly, because "tricolore" with an "e" is not an English word, so it basically pretends to be the way French people call it, whereas as I explained we don't call it "le tricolore". Check "Drapeau de la France" rticle on the French Wikipedia. Hardouin 01:36, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)
    • I second Hardouin; "le tricolore" is just the conventional nickname of the French flag. Us Québecois refer indirectly to our flag as "le fleurdelisé" and to the Canadian flag as "l'unifolié" in the same fashion. These are just periphrases. It may be it's used more in English than French ("le tricolore" seems more often used on this side of the Atlantic, apparently), but that is a moot point.Urhixidur 00:33, 2004 Nov 26 (UTC)
  • Agree to the move. Should not redirect based on Hardouin's explanation. DCEdwards1966 00:49, Nov 26, 2004 (UTC)
  • Agree. And please also move Tiranga to Flag of India. [[User:Neutrality|Neutrality/talk]] 21:13, Nov 27, 2004 (UTC)
  • Agree. But tricolore should stay, the term is sometimes used in English, and it should be a disambiguation page between Flag of France, Flag of Italy and tricolour. Nikola

[edit] History

"by 1789 the colours of Paris were no longer in use" I don't agree with that : In his diary, Gouverneur Morris wrote, on July 17th 1789 that when Louis XVI came to Paris on that day "The King’s Horse Guards, some of the Gardes du Corps, and all those who attend him, have the cockades of the city, viz., red and blue." and that, at the Hôtel de Ville, the King "put in his hat a large cockade of the red and blue ribbons, and then, and not till then, received the general shouts of “Vive le Roi!" marcparis6 09:57, May 10, 2005 (UTC). Nothing in your quotation is incorrect. The blue and red, on July 17th, were no more associated with the colours of the city of Paris... but, associated with white, to the Revolution... That's it. I don't see your point : Morris said that red and blue was then the coulours of the City of Paris. He didn't mention the symbol of the American revolution. "Most historians and specialists of flags, including those in France". Can you mentiononly one please ?

The first paragraph of "history" comes to an abrupt end ("It was stored in Saint-Denis abbey, where it was tak" (!)), somebody must have edited it and lost a fragment. If anybody knows what should be there, please correct it (and remove this when done). :) 138.4.2.169 17:17, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New, correct blue colour

I modified the blue color in the design part of "Flag of France" but the header has no edit button so I don't know how to change the main flag.--Titop33 18:52, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, I am a little awkward, as I am a newbie, but I found the "edit this page" button.--Titop33 18:57, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Not a problem, welcome ! :) Rama 19:14, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
As seen on Commons:Image talk:Flag of France.svg - the only sources quoted seem to be in favour of the previous colours being official, and not "RGB (0,85,164) and (239,65,53)" as the article presently claims. I've reverted the flag colours unless some quoted source claims otherwise. —Gabbe 13:03, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Vexillological symbol--missing ensigns

The Vexillological symbol for the flag indicates that the flag described in this article is the one intended for land use (three superior dots). The article also mentions that the ensign used by the navy differs only in the proportions of the bars. Alright, so we now have four out of the six dots figured out. What are the other two ensigns (the ones for private and state--non-military--use)? I'm assuming they're the same as the one used by the Navy, but... how do we know that? Would anyone knowledgeable of the flag care to include that somewhere in the article? (or perhaps point it out to me, in case I missed it)? Rod ESQ 20:26, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cross flag of the the Ancient Regime

http://flagspot.net/flags/crus1188.html#red http://flagspot.net/flags/fr~mon.html#civ

Ever notice how it fleshes (like England, Scotland and Ireland) nicely into the Union Jack? Perhaps it was all of an innocent origin, but I think it's slick! Just as the British dropped the royal arms of France, they come up with a national flag which inadvertantly adds France--like in Canada, adding the French arms! I am of both Huguenot and Roman Catholic French heritage, but absolutely treasure the old English claims. IP Address 05:04, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Influence

The flag is three vertical strips of colour. While it may have had some influence, it's quite bold to state, without citation, that it has influenced all those flags. Having such a large gallery also detracts from the true point of this article. violet/riga (t) 15:09, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Newfoundland & Iraq Flags on this page?

Frankly, I am at a loss as to why the flags of Newfoundland and Iraq are among the few displayed on this page. It makes absolutely no sense. There are dozens of more appropriate flags inspired by the tricolore that could be displayed here, including those of the Napoléonic states at the turn of the XIXe century (which would be an excellent addition), the French states of colonial Africa, or perhaps even the U.S. state of Iowa. Before I delete them myself, will someone explain why they feel the flags of Newfoundland (Terre-Neuve) and Iraq are justified here. Thank you. Charvex 03:20, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

just to let you know the flag of france is one of the most recognised flags in the world.

[edit] Missing pieces of this article

Reading this article for the first time, I'm struck by the absence of (1) any mention of the actual first date of adoption of the flag, (2) any extended discussion of the flag's association with the French Revolution and revolutionary ideology (the only mentions of the revolution are either indirect or in a caption), and (3) the flag's influence on other modern "republican" flags (Ireland, Italy, Mexico, etc.)

Were these elements included in past iterations of the article and deleted for some reason? If so, could someone restore them?P.D. 19:28, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Large blank space

Can the large blank space under "Design" be shortened somehow? Right now it might give the impression that the article is a stub that ends after the introduction. Funnyhat 06:27, 31 August 2007 (UTC)


[edit] White flag

The plain white flag was the flag used before 1789, and not the fleur-de-lissé flag, which was only used when for member of the royal family. I felt free to change this error. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.24.233.213 (talk) 17:17, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

As France was an Absolute Monarchy under the Bourbons, particularly with Louis XIV, in which France was the personal possession of the king (encapsulated in the possibly apocryphal, but nevertheless indicative, quote by Louis XIV: "L'État est Moi"), the Royal Flag of France should be used for the period 1624-1789. The Fleur de Lís of the ruling Bourbon family imposed on the white field of that flag demonstrates this. The idea of a 'national flag' predominating a royal flag at this time is an anachronism as the modern Nationalism idea of the French nation only comes into existence during the revolution. Wars during this period could only be conducted at the behest of the king of France, not the nation of France.Tttom1 (talk) 13:59, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] French battle flag

Is that supposed to be a piss take!?? The implcation being the French are cowards... :-/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.179.192.28 (talk) 23:52, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] HTML colors

After looking at the source code in the table under the "design" heading, I noticed that the HTML color codes used for the actual images of the colors (around the words "Blue," "White," and "Red") are different than the HTML color codes listed in the table as the actual codes. Can anyone comment on which are correct?--Vox Rationis (Talk | contribs) 18:46, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] History of the flag

Being French, the story I learned about the flag has always been the same, in school, readings or internet : the blue and red were Paris' colors and the white was the king's, refering to the revolution time, combination of the King and Paris.

Also "The Blue of the flag represents the great power or influence France has over other countries; the white, for purity; the red, for the bloodshed that must be lost in honor of their own country"

This affirmation seems realy strange to me and I never heard of this, so if true, there should be a reference. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.171.42.159 (talk) 06:48, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] On "Tricouleur"

I'm surprised nobody has made note of this sooner. The word "tricouleur" does NOT exist in French. Any native French speaker knows this, and although they could guess its meaning by association of "tri" (for "three") and "couleur" (for "colour"), they would correct this word immediately to "tricolore". Only non-native speakers might be tempted to create the word "tricouleur" (which, by the way, is a very sensible choice), but it is incorrect. So, there's no need to bicker over this term. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.72.93.5 (talk) 20:41, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] French Battle Flag

I removed that terrible joke of the French Battle Flag showing a white flag. That's terribly unimaginative trolling Matthieu (talk) 12:27, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Flag of the Bourbon Restoration

Sorry, but the page http://www.fotw.net/flags/fr_rest.html is the only one saying that the restorations flag was the Pavillon royal I found. There are several pages saying that it was the Drapeau blanc (enter "drapeau blanc" into the search function):

etc. Louis88 (talk) 11:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

As France was an Absolute Monarchy under the Bourbons, particularly with Louis XIV, in which France was the personal possession of the king (encapsulated in the possibly apocryphal, but nevertheless indicative, quote by Louis XIV: "L'État est Moi"), the Royal Flag of France should be used for the period 1624-1789. The Fleur de Lís of the ruling Bourbon family imposed on the white field of that flag demonstrates this. The idea of a 'national flag' predominating a royal flag at this time is an anachronism as the modern Nationalism idea of the French nation only comes into existence during the revolution. Wars during this period could only be conducted at the behest of the king of France, not the nation of France.Tttom1 (talk) 14:04, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
see:
http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/dgdisplaylargemeta.cfm?strucID=585779&imageID=1236061&parent_id=585395&word=&s=&notword=&d=&c=&f=&sScope=&sLevel=&sLabel=&lword=&lfield=&num=0&imgs=12&total=98&pos=1&snum=
on the reverse of this plate it says: "Le pavillon royal était véritablement le drapeau national au dix-huitième siecle...Vue du chateau d'arrière d'un vaisseau de guerre de haut rang portant le pavillon royal (blanc, avec les armes de France)."
http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/dgdisplaylargemeta.cfm?strucID=585780&imageID=1236062&parent_id=585395&word=&s=&notword=&d=&c=&f=&sScope=&sLevel=&sLabel=&lword=&lfield=&num=0&imgs=12&total=98&pos=2&snum=
Tttom1 (talk) 15:46, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
also:
http://www.mcsr.olemiss.edu/~mudws/flag/history.htm
"Flags of France, 1682-1763. LaSalle planted the white flag of the Bourbon kings of France at the mouth of the Mississippi River in 1682, and Iberville made the settlement at Ocean Springs under the same flag in 1699. Three golden fleurs-de-lis appeared on nearly all the Bourbon flags, though sometimes it was entirely white. The blue field of the French flag had officially disappeared by royal decree of Louis XIV in 1659." Similarly: http://www.tfdc.org/FrenchFlags.htm Tttom1 (talk) 15:57, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
George Ripley, Charles Anderson Dana, The American Cyclopaedia, New York, 1874, p. 250, "...the standard of France was white, sprinkled with golden fleur de lis...". *[1]The original Banner of France was strewn with fleurs-de-lis.:
http://www.msa.md.gov/msa/speccol/sc1500/sc1545/e_catalog_2002/1120research.html painting shows white flag with golden fleur de lis. more sources: http://www.geocities.com/brigman2000/flags2.html more: http://www.anyflag.com/history/fleurwht.htm "Prior to the French Revolution, there was no national flag which represented France. A variety of flags were used by troops, different types of ships and for other purposes. From 1590-1790 this flag is one of four that was used on warships and fortresses. The plain white flag, known as the Bourbon Banner, and this white flag with three golden fleurs-de-lis, a white flag with many fleurs-de-lis, or a white flag with many fleurs-de-lis with the arms of France in the center"Tttom1 (talk) 18:21, 29 April 2008 (UTC)